


Can't Love, Shot Full of Holes

by Anonymous



Category: Rocketman (2019)
Genre: Domestic Violence, Drug Use, Dubious Consent, M/M, Self-Destruction, alcohol use
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-21
Updated: 2019-06-21
Packaged: 2020-05-15 19:06:49
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,316
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19301950
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/
Summary: John knows exactly how to hit Elton hardest.





	Can't Love, Shot Full of Holes

**Author's Note:**

> This is not happy! It's fiction based solely on the characters depicted in Rocketman (ie, Richard Madden's smarmy accent) and NOT on the real life people. Please don't read if it makes you uncomfortable. Warnings are in the tags.

There is a fight. There is always a fight, but this one has teeth: this is _the_ fight. Elton is viciously tired, and viciously strung-out, and he can’t keep living in this unrelenting cycle. Argue, fuck, argue. Argue about fucking. Argue while fucking. Repeat.

“You and I are _done_ ,” he hisses. It is not the first time he’s said those words, but he means it this time, means it so deeply. He is trembling, from rage or drink or both. “I don’t care about your contract, I don’t care about you, I don’t _care_. Get the fuck out, John, or I’ll--”

“Or you’ll what?” John interrupts on a laugh. That is his way. His laugh is laced with venom. He makes no attempt to conserve it. “You’ll hit me, Elton? Is that what you’ll do? You can barely stand straight. Good luck aiming.”

“I will cut you off,” Elton says through gritted teeth, “I will find a way, I’ll make sure you never see a penny from me again--”

John steps forward, comes nose-to-nose with Elton, his eyes flashing dangerously, and from here Elton can smell the subtle sting of whiskey on his breath. There is only a shadow left of the man Elton fell in love with. Where had he gone, Elton wonders often. Or: was he ever even there at all?

“You don’t frighten me,” John breathes. There is a cut on the corner of his lip. Elton can’t remember if he put it there with mouth or hand; things were like that, between them. Even love and hate were interchangeable. “But don’t try to challenge me. I can hurt you in ways you’ve never thought possible.”

Before Elton can get a word out John silences him with a hand on his shoulder, thumb digging into the sensitive skin below his collarbone. He has touched every inch of Elton’s body. This is just another way. “Go get dressed,” he says in disgust. “Don’t embarrass yourself. People are coming over. Your precious Bernie will be here soon.”

“You invited Bernie?”

“You asked me to.”

He hadn’t. He wouldn’t. Not today. Not like this.

“We’re not finished with this,” Elton promises, but he is buckling, like always. He has to clean himself up. He hates to prove John right.

John is almost always right.

“No,” John agrees, and withdraws his hand with a self-satisfied smile. He is handsome and horrible, and Elton doesn’t know how to reconcile the two. “No, Elton. We’re not.”

*

There is a party. There is always a party, and this one is no different: crackling with electricity and heat, unrecognizable faces swimming before him, mountains of coke and oceans of alcohol in every goddamn corner. All of it the finest quality. John knows quality. Platters of food shipped in from foreign countries and crystal champagne flutes; his drink constantly topped off by a sea of strangers, a harmonious chorus of more more _more_. Life in excess, isn’t that what they liked to say.

For a moment: Bernie’s hand on his wrist. “You all right?” he asks, his eyebrows lifted in concern. Asked so softly Elton could almost cry. Bernie’s here. Nothing else matters. Bernie’s still here.

“Oh, he’s fine,” John says, stepping in; had he appeared out of thin air? “You know Elton. He’ll come down soon enough.”

Is he even _up_? He’d done a line, right. Maybe he’d done two. And the vodka, just to even things out. Bernie nods in understanding. The fingers on his wrist disappear. No, Elton wants to tell him. It’s not like that. Not this time. It’s not.

But of course it’s like that.

“Have a drink, Bernie,” John says, effortlessly charming, and snatches a silver pitcher from a nearby table. “Come on. I insist.”

“Yeah, all right,” Bernie says, and he gently raises his glass to Elton, gives him a smile coated in warmth. They drink together. John fills his glass again.

“Elton, darling.” John’s other hand is on his back, guiding him away. Elton’s not even sure his feet are touching ground. “Loads of people are waiting to say hi to you. Mustn’t disappoint them.”

“Stick around,” he asks Bernie, begs him, neck craned over his shoulder. “Please. Just for a bit. Have another drink.” He could say no to John. He could make his own decision, go off with Bernie on his own. But he doesn’t and they don’t. He knows what it would mean.

*

Another bump, and raucous laughter: there’s a topless girl in his lap, and she’s twisting her fingers into his necklace and telling a story he doesn’t care about. He is fine, and then suddenly he is not: he wants to be alone. No, he wants to be with Bernie. He shakes the girl off. He revolves around the party, asking _have you seen--_ to people who’ve never even met him. No, sorry, everyone says, sorry, who? until a friend of theirs with bloodshot eyes nods and gestures at the staircase, says _went upstairs with Reid a bit ago, didn’t he? I’m sure he did._

That’s odd, Elton thinks, and unlikely, but he goes anyway. He holds onto the banister for support. The two of them weren’t close. John doesn’t like Bernie. He’d said as much a dozen times before, when he wanted to hurt Elton, when he was feeling especially flippant and uncaring--

Bernie’s never said he doesn’t like John, but then. Bernie’s never been hard to read.

They are not in the hallway. They are not in the first bedroom he passes, nor the second. They are not in any of the useless rooms along the way and he’s about to turn around, chalk it up to his friend being sky-soaringly high, when he hears a noise: a keening sort. This house is no stranger to these sounds. Out of pure curiosity, he follows it.

It takes him to the master. The door is cracked, just a sliver, and a familiar irritation swells up inside of him. It was supposed to remain locked. John was supposed to lock it. How many times, he thinks, had he _specifically_ said--there were so many rooms for unholy activities, so many other places to go--this was _their_ room, it was _his_ \--

He pushes the door open with his foot.

His breath catches in his throat. 

The sound had come from his room. The sound had come from his Bernie. He’s on the bed, propped up on his elbows, his eyes closed and his shirt half-undone. His mouth is hanging open and his trousers are shoved down around his ankles. Elton realizes, furiously, this is something that he has imagined before. In actuality: he thinks he might be sick.

Because John is there too. John is crowded between Bernie’s thighs. John’s got his mouth wrapped around Bernie’s cock and Bernie’s fingers tangling through his hair. John always slaps Elton’s hand away, when he tries that--hardly ever, now, he’s more of a _receiver_ than a giver these days--but he makes exceptions, apparently, exceptions for Elton’s closest friend--

There is an obscene noise as John pulls off and looks over his shoulder at Elton, cold and unbothered by his appearance. He curls his hand around Bernie’s dick instead. “If you’re going to watch,” he says indifferently, “at least have a seat.”

Bernie opens his eyes, for the first time, but they’re heavy-lidded and unfocused. Like he’s not even there. “Reg?” he mumbles, and Elton’s heart constricts inside his chest.

“You’re a fucking monster,” Elton hisses at John, moving forward, but John puts a hand up and Elton, as if controlled by some greater force, stops dead.

“Oh, he wants it,” John says, pumping his fist around him leisurely. Bernie’s eyes slip shut again and he moans, quiet and needy, from the back of his throat. “Don’t you, Bernie?”

John twists his fingers a certain way and Bernie’s hips edge off the mattress. “God, yes,” he pants, uninhibited in a way that Elton has never, ever seen him before.

“He’s _wasted_ ,” Elton argues, but John just rolls his eyes.

“ _You’re_ wasted. You always are.” 

He’s right, of course. Of course he is. Elton doesn’t know what to do. There are waves of pleasure rolling across Bernie’s face. He doesn’t seem put off. If people only had sex sober then this mansion would be a monastery--

John smiles at him callously and then turns his face back in, swallows Bernie down in a way that makes Bernie gasp out loud. He is _good_ at that. He always has been. Elton takes a few unsteady steps back and sinks helplessly into an armchair. He should leave, but he doesn’t. He should do something, but he can’t. He should stop watching, but.

But Bernie’s perfect mouth is still open, and the strip of skin beneath his shirt is glistening with sweat, and glorious sounds are being pulled out of him, and in horror at himself, but unable to fight it, Elton’s cupping himself with his own hand, rubbing over his pants as John takes him down again, filthy and wet. 

When Bernie lets out a tortured “oh, oh shit--” it _does_ things to Elton, it sets his nerves on fire, it shoots painstaking pleasure down the column of his spine. He's never heard that, not from him. He can’t take his eyes off Bernie as his hips surge forward again, white-knuckling the duvet, and he's still watching as Bernie shivers right before he comes. John pulls his mouth off but works him through it. Tilts his head and locks his eyes on Elton’s, as if daring him: daring him to say something. To do something. Calling him a coward without even saying a word.

Elton doesn’t say anything. Doesn’t do anything.

“That’s a good boy,” John says, to Bernie or Elton or both, and he wipes his hand along Bernie’s shirt; no care to keep it clean. Throws a blanket over him without bothering to pull his pants up first. Bernie murmurs something indistinctive and rolls over on the mattress, sinks his head onto a pillow.

Elton’s still torturously hard. His heart is beating wildly in his chest. He thinks it might explode. He wishes that it would. John looks at him appraisingly and then moves to the armchair, crouches down so they’re eye-level. “You can explain this to him tomorrow,” he says quietly, and then he knocks Elton’s hand out of the way to replace it with his own. He squeezes Elton’s cock so hard that it’s painful, but then lets go and strokes him deftly, over his pants, and hatred burns in his stomach but he can’t help it, can’t help the fact that within moments he’s coming too, a sickening release. John smiles predatorily. 

“After all,” he says, standing up and straightening his suit, smoothing his hair back in its place. “You’re the one who told him to keep drinking. Though I suppose he’s not quite used to your concoctions.” 

Elton remembers, with a jolt of horror: the silver pitcher. Liquid mindfuck, he and John had taken to calling it. How could he have forgotten? How many glasses had Bernie had? Hot flashes of anger seize through his body: at himself, at John. At himself _because_ of John. He wants to hurt him, wants to tear him apart, wants--

“Clean yourself up,” John says with a sneer, tipping his chin at the stain on Elton’s pants. “Or, do you know what? Don’t. I don’t care. You’ll just end up choking on your own vomit tonight anyway, I’m sure.”

Bernie shifts on the mattress, flattens the pillow over his head. Elton and John turn to look at him, but then John shrugs and starts for the door.

Elton buries his face in his hands. There's nothing more that he can do.

*

Elton is awoken with a kiss, and it is at first so gentle, so pleasant, that he turns his face up into it, smiles blindly against John’s mouth. But then all at once, with a violent shock, he remembers. All of it. He shoves John away and shame burns through his body like a torch.

“Don’t touch me,” he spits at John, who is braced against the headboard and smirking. They are somehow in one of the guest rooms, and sunlight is streaming in all around them. Elton’s head aches. He’s naked. He doesn’t know what time it is. What day, for that matter.

“Ah,” John says, unoffended. “I suppose I _should_ have brushed my teeth after last night.”

Elton is going to be sick. The alcohol churns inside his stomach. The memory churns inside his mind. “I want you to leave. I want you to leave right now.”

John slips off the bed. He’s naked, too, and unabashed; he takes his time in collecting his clothing from the floor, in buttoning his shirt, in buckling his belt. Elton is shaking uncontrollably under the blankets. Finally, after an unhurried silence, and smoothing down a wrinkle on his front, John looks at him.

“I told you,” he says coolly. “I told you I could hurt you. Don’t you _ever_ threaten me again.” 

For once, Elton has nothing to say. John shakes his head, like he expected this. Like he already knows he’s won. “Go get Bernie out of our bedroom,” he says, turning to go. Elton wants to hurl the ceramic cat from the bedside table at his head, but he can’t muster up the strength. John grins. “If he’ll speak to you, that is.”

*

He is alone. He is always alone, but this time he feels it: it is perpetual. It can never be fixed. He finds an abandoned bottle in the hallway and drinks it to completion. He rubs leftover powder along his gums. He paces outside the doorway of the master bedroom. There’s a soft noise from inside. Viciously strung-out, and viciously miserable, he lifts his hand and knocks.


End file.
